The death of Baghdadi: How ISIS used al-Qaeda’s mistakes to grow a caliphate

Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF-OIR) French and American Soldiers supporting the siege on Al-Baghouz Fawqani pose for a photo on March 19, 2019. Four days later, the Syrian Defense Forces would declare victory over the Islamic State. Photo by user Philleydelphia on Wikimedia Commons

Optimistic predictions about the end of the Islamic State (ISIS) surged in the wake of US President Donald Trump’s October 27 press conference announcing the death of the ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but prove misguided in the long term. The threat posed by ISIS remains high, particularly outside the para-state’s previously held territories in Iraq and Syria (to say nothing of affiliated organizations from Libya to the Philippines). The death of Baghdadi is highly unlikely to significantly impact the organization in any substantive manner.

Initially, ISIS supporters remained quiet across social media
platforms, a silence interpreted by many analysts as indicative of
“chaos inside what is left of the leadership.” Within four days of Trump’s announcement,
however, official statements released by ISIS simultaneously confirmed
Baghdadi’s death and named his successor Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Quraishi, belying claims by US military forces that it leveled the compound.
Trump claimed that US troops also neutralized Abu al-Hassan al-Muhajir, alleged to be the member
likely next in line for Baghdadi’s position.

Premature triumphalism in public discourse
surrounding the ISIS leader’s death, most critically, obscures the very real
threat posed by the group. These optimistic assessments fail to accurately
account for the organization’s resilience and strategic objectives. It also
fails to understand the group as one that actively learns from, and dynamically
adapts to, changing situations on the ground—as well as the mistakes of previous non-state
armed groups—such as its predecessor al-Qaeda.

Premature triumphalism in public discourse surrounding the ISIS leader’s death, most critically, obscures the very real threat posed by the group.

Unlike al-Qaeda’s gradualist
approach to awakening and subsequently mobilizing Sunni Muslims for the end
goal of establishing a caliphate, ISIS will continue to exert considerable
appeal among sympathizers, given the achievement of claiming and controlling
territorial holdings for an extended period. Further, the threat posed by ISIS
has never been confined to an exclusively
territorial theater of combat; rather, what some dub “the virtual caliphate”—i.e.
the idea—remains viral, very much alive, and highly unlikely to dissipate
any time soon.

The mistakes of al-Qaeda contribute to the threat ISIS continues to
pose. Among other lessons ISIS drew from predecessors, the group proves far
more resilient to decapitation strikes due to an organizational structure
purposefully designed to provide not simply one, but in many cases, numerous
potential successors in the event of a key operative’s death. In contrast to al-Qaeda’s
delayed announcement of
Osama bin Laden’s death, and the six weeks elapsed before the group settled
upon a successor, within four days of Baghdadi’s death, official propaganda
channels crowned Quraishi in
conjunction with appeals for the immediate renewal of loyalty pledges from
affiliate organizations.

Al-Qaeda’s highly centralized, upper-echelon leadership presided
over a loose network of dispersed cells and was quickly driven to fragmentation
after the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. However, the Islamic State’s
territorial control and reason for controlling sister-city capitals in both
Raqqa and Mosul, is partially for durability. It intentionally created a
supranational spread that renders regrouping possible in the future; should the
security situation on the ground deteriorate.

Perhaps the most critical lesson ISIS drew from al-Qaeda’s
missteps—and one that continues to elude many analysts and pundits—concerns the
issue of leadership visibility. The identity of Baghdadi eluded many intelligence
specialists in the United States, a single photo from his detention in American
run-military prisons as the most readily verifiable
biographical information about the notorious ISIS leader.

SyriaSource provides on-the-ground coverage from local, regional, and international experts with timely news and analysis. It is dedicated to amplifying Syrian voices, alongside Atlantic Council researchers and fellows, to showcase issues most relevant to policymakers and pertinent to local concerns.

From the beginning, ISIS took considerable
security measures to obscure Baghdadi’s identity. Within the
organization, even high-level leadership rarely saw Baghdadi in person; even in
such rare instances, he appeared with face covered—practices that partially
account for his nickname
“the Ghost.” Moreover, ISIS propaganda
deliberately downplayed the caliphal figurehead of Baghdadi—unlike much of al-Qaeda’s
communications, in which the publicity-hungry leader serves as the charismatic
face of the organizational cause.

While Bin Laden issued numerous “proof of
life” videos upon reports of his death—as well unprompted, on many other
occasions—Baghdadi appeared in visual formats merely twice: the 2014 Ramadan
address at Mosul’s Great Mosque of al-Nuri, in which Baghdadi proclaims himself
caliph of the Islamic State, and a short video clip released by ISIS-affiliated media five years later,
in April 2019. Thereafter, Baghdadi’s only communications—themselves few and
far between—appeared in sporadic audio releases.

Certainly, Baghdadi exerted a certain appeal for some in the ranks,
but it is the very idea of the
caliphate itself that served—and will continue to do so—as the primary
influence and significant draw for sympathizers of the Islamic State. Indeed, long before the declaration of a
caliphate or Baghdadi’s ascension to the helm of predecessor organization
Mujahideen Shura Council (MSC), ISIS shrouded Baghdadi in mystery to such an
extent that many within the US military, MSC membership, and rival organizations
wondered if any such leader existed at all.

This deliberate decision to relegate the key figurehead to the background will enable the Islamic State to sustain itself in the future.

In the wake of naming Baghdadi’s successor, the
ISIS announcement drew similar speculation. If the organization’s history proves anything,
expect the same careful obfuscation of any identifying information that provide
biographical detail for Quraishi.

This deliberate decision to relegate the key figurehead to the background will enable the Islamic State to sustain itself in the future. Beyond territorial control, the group’s preference for the idea of a revived caliphate, rather than leadership, ensures the threat of ISIS will continue. This continuation is likely to be a viral contagion contingent on no singular individual, or organizational capacity for kinetic operations.

The separation of
territorial control and leadership loyalty from the idea of the caliphate, in
fact, enables us to make key predictions about the post-Baghdadi future of
ISIS. Languishing in a northern Iraq prison, unrepentant ISIS fighter Muhammad
Hasik dismissed the death of Baghdadi as
insignificant, predicted upcoming attacks on European soil, and concluded that
the so-called caliph’s neutralization makes “no difference,” as “the people
exist. The people are there. . . It’s more dangerous than before.”

Not only have attacks in
the so-called West increased alongside territorial losses incurred by ISIS—as
predicted—and are highly like to continue, but the central objective of such
operations remains the eradication of the “grayzone,” a phrase used by the
group in reference to spaces of coexistence between Muslim and non-Muslim. ISIS
attacks in non-Muslim majority nations are expressly intended to create
blowback for, and incite attacks against Muslim citizens in those countries.

This strategic approach
to divide-and-conquer should be familiar to the United States military planners
as Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi—the founder of al-Qaeda in Iraq, the closest
organizational branch—successfully pioneered such communitarian attacks during
the US occupation. In the process, it transformed an insurgency into a
prolonged, sectarian civil war—the ensuing cyclical revenge violence opening up
a space from which the Islamic State would later emerge.

No longer confined to
Shia versus Sunni conflict, ISIS has taken what this author terms “Zarqawi 101” and simply globalized it. The “ghost” of not only
Baghdadi, but Zarqawi, lives on. Under the leadership of Quraishi, we should expect much of the same.

Former US President Barack Obama
neutralized Bin Laden, but did not eradicate al-Qaeda. Nor will President
Trump’s successful assassination of Baghdadi destroy ISIS. The Islamic State
has learned considerably well from the mistakes of the past—and it is high time
the United States do the same: learn from history, lest we be doomed to repeat
it, and the hydra will only continue to grow.

Amanda E. Rogers is a National Endowment for Humanities visiting assistant professor of Middle Eastern & Islamic Studies at Colgate University. Follow her on Twitter: @MsEntropy.

This is a serious but not fatal blow to the Islamic State, and the generational conflict against Salafi jihadist organizations is far from over. The Islamic State’s center of gravity will increasingly be its narrative pull rather than its claim to represent a governing caliphate.

The Islamic State was crippled this past year in several fierce battles with the international coalition, but is regrouping and the international community needs to recognize this and redevelop its strategy.

Subscribe to our newsletter

Sign up for the New Atlanticist newsletter, which showcases expert analysis from the Atlantic Council community on the most important global issues. Featuring breaking news reactions, opinion pieces, explainers, and focused analyses, New Atlanticist provides a comprehensive look at the top global headlines and the challenges facing the international community.

This website or its third-party tools use cookies, which are necessary for its functioning and required to achieve the purposes illustrated in the cookie policy.

You accept the use of cookies as per our Cookie Policy and Privacy Policy by closing or dismissing this notice, by scrolling this page, by clicking a link or button or by continuing to browse otherwise.Ok